Posts by Adam Berdine

It Is Not Easy Being Told, It Is Not Easy Telling How would you describe children? Your children? What is remarkable about children? One that gets overlooked is their innate honesty. I call it brutal honesty. This honesty makes for some memorable situations, embarrassing and hilarious at the same time. Mine can’t hold back. It is not that they are nit-picky to be overly critical, I think it is just who they are, who most kids are. “Dad, you got…

Incarceration Words elicit images in the mind.  Phrases do much the same.  Ever been asked to use one word to describe something?  Words convey information, true, but also at play is our familiarity with the language we hear and/or use.  From our youth, we learned that the heart is where good things live- love and smiles.  In reality the “heart” is the strongest muscle in the human body where our lifeblood pistons through our bodies.  We understand what is meant…

Perspectives of the Cross There were various perspectives of the ones who saw Jesus crucified. How could they all be seeing the same thing and yet their views be different? Let’s look briefly at some of them. 1. The Roman soldiers saw a man that they had been given the job of crucifying. They saw a Jew that was hated by his fellow countrymen, but so what? That meant nothing to them. They were indifferent to Jesus’ plight. They had…

Why Do Children Cry When babies hurt or need something, when all is not the way it should be, they cry out to their parents. Even as young children acquire language, some thoughts and feelings continue to transcend the limits of their vocabularies, leaving crying as the only option to communicate what truly is transpiring within them. And if we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that we adults can still relate. As we grow, the harsh realities of…

Preparing for Parenting Sometimes, the most glorious moments can also be the most terrifying. Preparing to be a parent rightly evokes such mixed emotions. As adults who have had ample time to come to grips with our own weakness and fallibility, is there anyone among us who feels completely confident about shaping the heart of a child, training him in the ways of the Lord, demonstrating for her what it means to live a life full of faith in God?…

In Loving Memory of Lost Children Over the last two weeks, we have noted that nothing about death is good, yet God’s goodness remains, even when we are faced with death. This week, I hope we can see through the comfort of the Scriptures how much God truly cares about those plagued by the pain of loss. God hears. God sees. God understands. God Cares. When Hagar flees from Sarai, the angel of the Lord finds her in the wilderness…

June 30 In Loving Memory of Lost Children “No parent should have to bury their child.” This quote from last week summarizes what  comes to mind when we consider the death of a child. Truly, no parents should have to come to terms with the death of their children. Yet they do. I would like to continue to share some thoughts about this kind of loss, but first let me clarify a few things. I am not pretending to know…

In Loving Memory of Lost Children “Where is Théodred? Where is my son?” If you are not familiar with this sad quote, it comes from the film The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. In it, a king named Théoden awakens from a cursed stupor to find that his beloved son Théodred is dead. During an exchange with Gandalf, following Théodred’s funeral, Théoden utters what everyone is thinking. “No parent should have to bury their child.” There is a…